


My Idiot Bestie

by rebelmeg



Category: Captain America (Movies), Iron Man (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Avengers Tower, Best Friends, Brooklyn Brothers, Bucky Barnes Remembers, Domestic Avengers, F/M, MIT bros, Making Friends, Rhodey and Bucky both have an idiot best friend and it's a bonding moment, Tony and Steve do not find this amusing, crack and humor, minor Pepperony
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-12
Updated: 2019-06-12
Packaged: 2020-05-01 18:45:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 984
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19183555
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rebelmeg/pseuds/rebelmeg
Summary: Rhodey and Bucky really do have a pair of doofuses for best friends.  And a whole lot of stories to share.





	My Idiot Bestie

**Author's Note:**

  * For [LBibliophile](https://archiveofourown.org/users/LBibliophile/gifts).



> I found [this on Tumblr](https://rebelmeg.tumblr.com/post/185529582881/if-rhodey-had-been-in-avengers-steve-big-man-in) and this fic fell right into my brain.

Pepperony plus Rhodey and the Brooklyn Brothers were in the communal kitchen/living room of the Tower when it went down. Steve, who had been trading mostly friendly jibes with Tony all morning, poured himself some juice and made another snarky comment about the size of the Tower maybe being compensation for something. 

Tony’s jaw dropped exaggeratedly. “Pepper, call the lawyers. This is as bad as the time he’d known me for five minutes and then asked me what I’d be if I took off the suit.”

Rhodey, who was sitting at one end of the island counter reading the newspaper and sipping coffee, was clearly not as oblivious to the conversation as he seemed. He muttered, just loud enough for the rest of them to hear, “Five foot eight, hundred and eighty pounds of pure idiot, that’s what.”

The scandalized look of utter betrayal that Tony sent him made Steve choke on his juice, spluttering as it splashed everywhere. Bucky glared at him from his spot at the other end of the island, reaching out to wipe the juice splatters on his hand on Steve’s shirt.

“James Rupert Rhodes, how dare you! You know I’m at least five nine!”

“You once told TMZ you’re five-eleven.” Pepper chimed in from her spot on the sectional next to Tony.

Rhodey snorted into his coffee. “Maybe in your sparkly unicorn dreams.”

Steve, who had just mopped up most of the juice mess, went so red from suppressed laughter that he slid out of sight and flopped on the kitchen floor, emitting faint snickering, choking sounds. Bucky was even smirking as he played Sudoku on his phone.

Tony was glaring between the four of them (well, between Pepper, Rhodey, Bucky, and the island counter that Steve was sprawled behind) as if he were trying to set them on fire just through his visual rage.

“I don’t know what you’re laughing about,” Bucky kicked at Steve’s foot. “You think I’ve forgotten about the kind of crap you pulled? Ninety pounds soaking wet and barely clearing five-four, with a chip on your shoulder the size of Manhattan.”

Steve wasn’t laughing anymore, and he sounded distinctly grumpy when he retorted, “Ninety-five pounds. And I was hoping you hadn’t remembered.”

Bucky leaned over to look at him, “Dumbassery that profound can’t ever be truly forgotten.”

Rhodey raised his mug at Bucky. “I salute you. We should talk sometime. Swap stories.”

“Um, no, no, that’s not an approved activity in this Tower,” Tony interjected, the same time as Steve sat up, the very top of his blond head just visible over the top of the island, all but shouting, “No!”

Bucky switched over to the calendar on his phone. “I’m down. When are you free? We should hit a burger joint or something, there’s so many places now and I wanna try them all.”

Amidst emphatic protests and all kinds of pleading, Rhodey and Bucky set themselves a lunch date for that Thursday, burgers and gossip at Rhodey’s favorite local greasy spoon.

“We’ll order the pancakes too, Bonnie makes them big as a plate and fluffy as a pillow. You’ll think you’ve died and gone to heaven. And I know the best Mexican places around, both Tex-Mex and authentic.”

“If you can point me in the direction of tamales as good as the ones Rosalita Perez made in the 30’s, I’ll tell you about the time Steve picked a fight with an entire football team of bozos when we were sixteen.”

“Tony once blew up a bathtub full of water while I was out getting a haircut. Just… demolished it, nothing left but rubble, him standing there soaking wet and without a scratch, and a hole in the ceiling. He still has no idea how he did it.”

Sitting on the sectional with his arms and legs crossed, glowering darkly, Tony was the very picture of high-key disapproval. “I don’t like this.”

Pepper kissed his cheek as Rhodey offered his fist for a bump and he and Bucky left the kitchen with a grumpy Steve in tow. “Maybe if you’d given Rhodey a chance to be more of an idiot in college rather than babysitting you, you’d have some blackmail to hold over his head.”

“He _was_ an idiot! All the time! He just… happened to be with me all those times…” Tony trailed off and muttered something under his breath.

Pepper giggled and ruffled his hair as she headed for a coffee refill. “Poor you.”

Steve, looking all kinds of patriotically pissed, stomped back into the room and thumped down on the sectional adjacent to Tony hard enough to shake the floor, crossing his arms and legs exactly like his couchmate. “They’re going to get pizza and compare notes on how being best friends with us adversely affected their mental health. I’m not invited.” 

Tony glanced over at him, eyes narrowed. “They say which pizza place?”

That startled Steve a little, and he thought about it for a second. “Marcello’s?”

“Oh, that dick.” Yanking his phone out of his pocket, Tony tapped the screen and held it to his ear. A few seconds later, he barked, “You better bring me back a pepperoni and onion with extra garlic or _you are dead to me_.”

Throwing the phone to the other side of the sectional, he slumped down into a deep slouch and continued frowning. After a few minutes of heavy silence, he looked over at Steve.

“Bucky didn’t happen to ever do anything really stupid when you were kids, did he?”

Steve made a face. “Well, yeah, sure. But I was always the one doing the stupid stuff with him.”

Tony sighed, wondering idly why he and Steve didn’t get along better, when a muffled noise from the kitchen made him flail around on the couch and point his finger accusingly at his girlfriend.

“PEPPER POTTS, YOU STOP LAUGHING RIGHT NOW!”


End file.
